AN: This is unbeta'd, and I'm on cold medicine. Hooray.


Three days into haunting a forest like in her not-so-distant genin childhood, Kei thrummed with nervous energy.

Not that watching the hero kids train, and fail, and train again wasn't at least a little entertaining, but Kei had more than a few reasons to be wary. The most persistent one started with "v" and ended in "-illains," because of course it did. This entire world came down to a wacky, flawed paradigm that placed a bunch of first-year high school students squarely in the crossfire. Or with bullseyes painted on their collective backs.

Maybe it was for the best that they were all training to have more impressive power outputs.

After the USJ attack, the Musutafu incident, and the persistent media circus, it would be difficult to conclude the enemy does not have a firm target in mind.

Yeah, but the question is if they have a specific target, or if they're just trying to harass the entire class until somebody fucks up.

Or died.

Most villains seemed pretty okay with the idea of murdering teenagers. Kei didn't exactly have much moral high ground to play with, but, dammit, at least she chose to not be a serial killer. Hell, her first kill had been someone younger than any of the friends she'd made here, and she could still see exactly where the line was between her and any of the villains she'd encountered on this mission. And she hadn't followed through on her or any of Isobu's impulses toward permanently ending threats to her clients.

She kind of wanted to meet a Hero Killer fanboy, for the sole purpose of giving them a piece of her mind.

In the meantime, Kei waited. Coiled, contained. For now.

The kids would do their little test of courage thing and be fine. Kei still thought the entire concept was bizarre, though.

It wasn't that she didn't understand it. Haunted houses and corn mazes and other goofy diversions were popular among teenagers the world over. But, well, her instincts still rattled like dice in her head. This was not a useful exercise.

A spooky night of fun…which was cheerfully causing every irritating security risk that implied. With almost all of 1-B in the woods, lurking with the intent to spook 1-A, the only person who could keep track of everyone at once was Ragdoll. Obito and Kakashi did their best, but neither of them specialized in spamming Shadow Clones to scout for everything. Kei's chakra sense was the next best thing to useless. It wasn't a great situation.

How dare they let kids be kids, right? Gah. She didn't resent anybody involved in this, aside from the villains, but it was frustrating all the same.

Kei couldn't pinch the bridge of her nose through the mask, but she did rest her chin in her hands. This was going to be a long night.

I have a question, seeing as we are not moving.

Yeah?

Your cover during this stage of the mission is that you and your friends have gone home for vacation. You are not expected to report in to anyone during this time, except for your teammates. Correct?

It is, Kei replied warily.

I would like a vacation, too, Isobu rumbled thoughtfully, hands resting on each other. In a quieter tone, he added, I miss Yin and Yang Kurama, as pathetic as that is. They likely do not miss me.

Well, only Yin Kurama might admit it. Yang would tell you to go to hell.

Isobu snorted. That might be. I should ignore Yang Kurama and see how he likes it.

Isobu?

Hm?

When we go home, let's hang out with those two again. It'll be fun. Especially if we get to see how their calligraphy is coming along.

This time, Isobu's rumble was a bit more optimistic. I look forward to it.

Kei tapped her throat microphone with one finger. Once she heard the faint beep of her boys clearing off the open signal, she said softly, "Status report. Any changes?"

Her voice came out husky and moderately scrambled thanks to the vocoder in her Isobu-shaped mask. There wasn't anyone close enough to see or hear her—not while she sat on the roof of the Pussycats' lodge and behind an air conditioning unit—but it was never a good idea to get lazy about stealth. Too any casual observer, the only thing to see were the bright lights and paw-shaped sign on the building. A little white-faced gargoyle, tucked into shadow, was the next best thing to invisible.

"This is Crane. No changes yet. Ragdoll confirmed it," was Obito's reply, equally warped by electronic noise.

According to Kei's mental map of the area—reinforced by her chakra sense, security seals, and having two teammates in the woods—Obito stood roughly ten meters from the group's only fully functioning sensor-type person. She knew he was there because they'd all done the introductory song and dance three days ago, and because her Quirk didn't let genjutsu slide. Obito's job was to snap up Ragdoll at the first sign of trouble and get her back to her teammates, regardless of other considerations. Once the human-radar and the teleporter got that out of the way, an ambush could properly take shape.

It was so much easier to make sure everyone got a complementary stab wound if there was a list to check their progress.

And for once, all of you are armed appropriately for the task.

Isobu wasn't wrong. For the first time in months, Kei and her teammates all had a full ANBU mission loadout. Armor upgrades were nice, but her hand kept drifting back to the handle of the katana she hadn't used in far too long. Unlike Obito, she'd brought her own instead of filling out a requisition order. Hers was better than the standard-issue katana anyway. As expected, the rest of their kits included exploding tags, illusion and barrier seals, and at least one of the hilariously botched camping equipment seals from ages ago.

"Wolf reporting. Eraserhead exposed my position to Midoriya. Relocating now." Even with his voice sounding more like a pack-a-day smoker in a Darth Vader mask, Kakashi still managed to get his irritation across.

Kei sighed, mostly to herself. That kid was going to get killed someday, probably by sticking his nose into the wrong mess. "Understood. Continue as normal. Turtle out."

Isobu waited until there was less of a chance one of Kei's teammates would report in, then said, I hope one of the humans steps on a landmine.

Kei rested the back of her hooded head against the vent, feeling the buzz through her entire skull. I hope the kids don't touch any of the seals on the perimeter.

They weren't nearly as dangerous as the explosive seals—which she had deliberately left underpowered for the sake of obeying pro heroes' murder/manslaughter taboos—but slamming an unprepared person into a genjutsu was probably at least considered "rude." Before this stage of the mission, Kei hadn't even been sure genjutsu would work on the local humans, only to get a volunteer in the form of Tiger. Turned out that yes, they did. And even accidentally running into a tree (to no effect) wouldn't snap someone out of them.

Detection seals would let Kei know if any humans crossed their thresholds, which gave her team warning enough to meet the problem if it came overland. The forest was littered with them in every direction, radiating outward from the lodge. The spiderweb seal array ensured Kei would know the exact position of any intruder—but only once. Knowing the enemy had a teleportation option sometimes meant the best option was to catch them mid-attack. The day's worth of work for Sensei and his clones wouldn't go to waste, no matter which day the villains showed up.

The problem was still that they would . Even without his dogs, Kakashi's sense of smell was sharp enough to pick out a large group of humans traipsing through the woods for the last two nights. After haunting the kids' training ground for twenty minutes the day after, he'd confirmed that none of them had wandered that far. After discounting all the pros, that left either lost hikers or deeply unpleasant creeps. With only those two options, Team Minato's summer vacation was spent going around loaded for bear.

Figuratively, anyway. They'd chase off any literal bears, too.

I have been storing chakra for months for a proper confrontation. Isobu rubbed his hands together, which was about as evil as he got without explicitly threatening to eat somebody.

Having to manage more than forty potential civilian casualties says that might have to stay on the backburner. Kei thumbed the guard on her sword, sliding the blade a couple of centimeters out of the sheath. Then back in, with a soft clicking noise. And out. It was kind of meditative. Still, I suppose it depends on what the villains chuck in our faces next. Do you think you can keep me going at V2 for longer this time?

Of course I can! Isobu huffed. Even if one of your opponents hoped to match the Hokage—which I doubt —I learn from my mistakes. As ought you, given how much chakra you expended during the tournament months ago. Regulating chakra output will be all too easy.

Thanks, Isobu.

Thank me by using it properly. And kill something.

Kei pursed her lips and said nothing, letting her silence stand as an answer.

I can hear your judgment. Pah.

I might make an exception for like, a Nōmu. But the rest of the people we're fighting probably fall under the heading of "We'd absolutely be charged with murder."

Only if they find out.

Kei rolled her eyes, pleasantly exasperated. With friends like these, she never needed a cheering section. Did need a better conscience, though.

I made you laugh.

Maybe. Give me half a decade to figure out how to return the favor.

I can wait.

It turned out that they didn't really have to. Roughly ten minutes of silent banter later, Kei got the first inkling that the situation was entirely untenable. The perimeter detection seals on the far side of the kids' playground didn't go off—because why the fuck would they actually function as intended with a teleporter around—but the internal network did.

In ten different locations. Then eleven, then twelve.

Kei let out a subvocal growl as she felt more and more pings against her chakra sense, as lopsided as the effect was through seals figuratively wired to her brain. Fuck you, Kurogiri.

"Turtle to all points," Kei murmured, finger on the transmitter. The open channel was traceable, but only by people whose technology was as wonky as Konoha's. "A dozen intruders have entered the forest. Stand by for grid coordinates."

Her ears briefly filled with static, thanks for several people trying to respond at once. Kei got to her feet, sheathed her katana, and peered out into the dark. Despite everyone's lack of perfect night vision, the villains' decision to attack on a full moon gave the defenders about as much of a leg up as they could have.

It wasn't saying much. Still, the pros and shinobi snapped into combat mode as though they were born to it.

Right on cue, given the haze of blue and smoke starting to rise from the forest.

A flame-producing Quirk, probably in conjunction with other bullshit Kei could handle if she was out of this persona, exactly as it always seemed to be. Damn them.

"Wolf to Turtle. There are still more than twenty students at risk." A pause on Kakashi's end, just for a split second. "Enter the forest on my signal, not before."

"Crane to all points. Ragdoll's been relocated. Heading to rendezvous with Wolf."

"Ragdoll to all points! The Wild, Wild Pussycats are here and ready to go!" Her voice seemed a little off, but that was probably a side effect of moving through Kamui for the first time.

Isobu hummed in the back of her mind as he wove a camouflage genjutsu over Kei's form, making her shape that much harder to pick out in the dark. He didn't even need her to make seals.

"Eraserhead to Turtle and Ragdoll," was Aizawa-sensei's bitter reply, "Give me those grid coordinates, now."

Between Kei and Ragdoll—mostly Ragdoll, because Kei's seals were a one-and-done sort of deal—most of the villains' positions were identified. But, for better or for worse, there was no way to automatically know their Quirks without getting within spotting range and damn well figuring it out.

There were still forty students to defend from villains who were probably going to be all too willing to kill every single one.

At least the remedial kids were already inside. Not that they couldn't fight, but there were fewer potential casualties to track. That meant Monoma, Kirishima, Ashido, Sero, Kaminari, Mineta, and Satō were all probably well out of danger. Small mercies.

All right, everyone. Keep your radios up, because this is going to get messy and my Quirk only works in one direction, Mandalay's voice said, presumably ringing in every hero's head at once. We have multiple villains in the forest, some of whom are dangerously close to our students. We're going to regroup at the lodge, so do everything you can to defeat the villains and get everyone out of danger!

"Crane to all points: One of the villains has a fire Quirk!" Obito's voice barked over the line. "Heading to engage!"

Shit. Enemies with AOE attacks were nobody's idea of fun.

Kei wished, not for the first time, that someone shelled out for night vision goggles. If she wasn't going in the forest without Kakashi's permission, then she needed to find something else to make herself useful. Maybe dropping an actual rainstorm on everything would keep the kids that much more safe.

Ready when you are.

It just so happened that Aizawa-sensei ran out of the building at almost the exact moment Kei was about to drop off the roof. The blue fire building in the forest would distract any responsible adult who had kids out in the thick of it. Aizawa-sensei was many things, but a deadbeat was not one of them.

But Kei looked before she leapt, and spotted the figure hiding around the blind corner with enough spare time to draw her sword.

Aizawa-sensei nearly got char-broiled for not taking the time to look left.

"Your concern has you distracted, Eraserhead."

"Vlad—"

The difference between being a pile of ashes and a live hero turned out to be the width of a fingernail. Blue fire lit the front of the building in a near-spherical explosion, but Aizawa-sensei managed to swing himself to safety like hobo Batman using his capture weapon. That put him about three solid meters above the villain's head, and about one below Kei's feet.

"Guess you really are a pro—"

The capture weapon lashed out as soon as Aizawa-sensei neutralized the villain's Quirk, extinguishing all but embers. There was a gag in some cartoons that had a character getting instantly wrapped up like a mummy, but it was the first time Kei had actually seen it happen.

What the hell. Aizawa-sensei had this.

She sat on her heels and peered over the edge of the roof as Aizawa-sensei proceeded to hand out free beatdown, sort of like the one he'd pulled off against the Nomu ages ago. Only this time he apparently wanted the guy alive.

And conscious. To answer questions.

Kei would've clubbed him unconscious with a cast iron frying pan and sorted it out in a police holding cell after the crisis was over.

Still. Blue flames here. Blue flames in the forest. Which were ongoing , despite the Erasure Hero having canceled out the immediate threat. The fire wasn't even changing color like it ought to in absence of propellant. Wood fires burned in the warm parts of the color spectrum.

Unless Quirk bullshit.

Kei had a hunch. It hinged on the idea that, due to weight of numbers, there probably weren't two villains with Quirks for producing blue fire. And that there was a reason why the number of villains went up after they all showed up at once, even with a teleporter who'd probably learned the getting-punched-in-the-face lesson once.

It probably wasn't sound logic.

Then again, she'd spent the better part of two years of her life possessed by a turtle monster. Rationality filed for divorce ages ago. Clones were definitely a thing.

"Wolf to Turtle," Kakashi said, over the radio. "Stand by for telepath burst from Mandalay."

It seemed the rain would have to wait.

"Turtle to Wolf and Mandalay. Standing by," Kei responded, as Isobu's chakra began to stir properly. Genjutsu was hardly taxing.

Mandalay's mental voice was…well, Kei had asked for things to kick up. Selfishly. Seemed about right that the voice was sharp enough to split her skull. Turtle, find Kōta! Midoriya-kun went to find him, but Ragdoll says there's a villain already there! Mandalay rattled off the grid coordinate their group was using, indicating a spot not too far from the lodge. You might be the only one who can get to them now!

Specifically, the spot was Kōta's hideaway.

There was a little part of Kei's brain that turned off. Everything short of her professional mask drowned in a cold, merciless tide.

Isobu, cloak! Even as they used the Body Flicker with enough force to make the world blur into dark grays and greens, Kei tucked her sword away. It would be better to keep it sheathed until she had someone worth stabbing for real. Just like we did when Sensei tried to outrun us!

I thought you would never ask. Isobu's chakra boiled out of the seal on Kei's chest, wrapping her in translucent orange-red energy. His laughter rattled through the entire cloak as she used tree after tree as launchpads, sending a blast of killing intent out in all directions. Let us give a human a beating he would do best to forget.

Isobu's "night vision" was adapted for the depths of the ocean. One eye or not, Kei didn't need to be a Hyūga to see where she had to go when he felt like sharing his senses. Between the firelight, stars, and the full moon, the forest around the Pussycats' lodge might as well have been under spotlights.

It took Kei less than fifteen seconds to reach the fight, and an instant longer to assess the situation.

Villain: All hail the Meat Mountain, god of performance-enhancing drugs. Over two meters tall even before his transformation into a walking jerky advertisement, the guy had one eye and a camera installed in his head.

Kei dropped out of the sky in front of him.

Addendum: The villain was also blond and looked as though half his face had been held to a belt sander. It might be useful information later, for all she knew.

Midoriya: Alive, but badly injured, barely standing, and throwing green lightning everywhere even as he bled into the dirt. At a glance, his left arm hung limp as he stood there and panted, and road burn meant he'd be spending time under a healer's watchful eye after tonight was over. The crater in the cliff also looked Midoriya-sized.

Kōta: Alive and unhurt, which Kei appreciated. She owed Midoriya a thank-you later.

Or now. By saving his life.

"What do we have here? Another wannabe hero?" He smiled like Hidan. That expression belonged on someone who killed people for fun.

Kei's eyes narrowed behind her mask, even as she rested her right hand against the hilt of her sword. With Isobu's chakra filling the air around her, fear was maybe the second-last thing on her mind.

The first, by far, was getting this guy's attention on her. Irrevocably. She'd tanked a hit from All Might; this guy was a featherweight in comparison.

"Y'know, I was just thinkin' this was too easy," he went on, muscle fiber swishing like fish fins in a current. It was gross as all hell, even without blood. "Forty baby heroes are easy pickin's, pros or not. Maybe Vlad King or Eraserhead or Tiger would be worth botherin' with, but that's a lotta kids runnin' around unguarded. Maybe you're the vanguard, like me…"

This guy's Quirk seemed to make him the chatty counterpart of the USJ Nōmu. It wasn't that he bulked up—instead, his actual muscle fibers behaved like Kakuzu's black threads and moved according to his whim. Even outside of his skin. It was like looking at someone with All Might's full-sized build, but after having been flayed alive and painstakingly pulled apart in some macabre anatomy exhibit.

Kei wasn't the type of person who could banter with sworn enemies, even if she wanted to. Everything came out trite and dull as dishwater. Or she screamed at them, which was an excellent way to turn heads, but nothing else.

Kei raised a hand and used Gai's "come and get it" gesture. Good enough for a beginner, and it gave her time to get her right hand back to her katana afterward.

"Hah! Or are you another sorry-ass Stain groupie like Spinner? Touting your ideals—"

Complete amateurs blathered instead of fighting. A pro could do both.

The villain's fist cracked the ground where Kei had just been.

A meter away, Kei idly bobbed from foot to foot as though she hadn't just poured on a bit of shinobi speed to dodge that strike.

The villain followed, with all the grace of a boulder bouncing downhill. "—like they make you any better—"

Swing and a miss. The guy barreled right past her and into a cliff, making the Midoriya-sized crater look like a pothole. Was this his actual top speed?

"— than a guy who just enjoys killin'?" The villain spasmed, muscle fibers exploding out of him like someone dropped dynamite in a paint can. "Ain't you gonna give me somethin' to work with, here? Some declaration of 'justice' or how you're gonna protect everyone?" Pinkish flesh coiled around his arm and chest, while a grin of pure anticipation and bloodlust curled across his face. "How about—"

Basically, it was super creepy.

Midoriya gaped. "Wh—"

"Turtle!" Kōta shouted, as the guy drew back his well-hidden fist. Kei could only tell he was winding up for a haymaker because the stance looked familiar. Everything else vanished under writhing muscles.

Kei's thoughts, as the villain swung, went something along the lines of: Why the fuck had a kink in genetics given this guy the ability to turn into a homicidal meatball? How was this necessary?

Hardly matters. Oh, and—

Replacement Jutsu,they thought together.

"LET'S SEE SOME BLOOD!" The monstrous fist crashed down, launching a reasonable facsimile of Kei's form into the cliff before slamming bodily into it. A second blow fell, then a third, while the villain laughed like his damn life depended on it.

In the heartbeats between the villain committing to his attack and Kei reappearing behind him, Midoriya crossed the combat zone and managed to scoop Kōta up with his right arm. His left still hung limp, but his eyes fixed on Kei. The look on his face mingled fear, determination, and a scrap of hope that was gone before Kei could be sure, but one thing was clear: Midoriya would prioritize Kōta.

He was fast, clever, and very invested in not getting smashed into bone paste by this dickhead. With any luck, he'd avoid breaking his left arm to match his right.

Kei would get the wannabe Kakuzu clone all to herself.

Fine by me.

Kei stood back a bit and waited for the villain to notice he was punching splinters into stone. A split-second ninjutsu like that didn't have a long life expectancy anyway.

It took a surprisingly long time. Upward of ten seconds. By that point, Midoriya had already activated his wacky Quirk, spiriting Kota away and around the corner. His footsteps were entirely drowned out by the sound of rock splintering. Hell, by the time the sound stopped, Midoriya and Kota were both poking their heads back around the corner, like they couldn't believe they were getting away with this either.

…What the fuck was wrong with this guy? Besides the obvious. Most people Kei knew would know the target had left the building after the first strike.

This guy was emphatically not worth her time.

"His name's Muscular!" Midoriya shouted, because he had no self-preservation instincts. At all. "He has a muscle augmentation Quirk, Turtle-san! He's a murderer with the League of Villains!" Midoriya swallowed, a greenish glow flaring up around him and nearly blotting out Kōta entirely. He was death to night vision.

Before he'd even finished that first sentence, Kei shifted so she stood in the middle of the quickest path between the villain and potential victims. The guy thought and moved in straight lines. Like someone going a hundred kilometers in the wrong direction.

In this scenario, Kei was a spike strip.

Muscular lurched, finally tearing his gaze from what had to be the longest-lasting Replacement in history. Kei's report on this moment was going to have this section circled twice in red pen and dotted with question marks.

"You're tricky," Muscular said with a grin. "I like that. But you're not so fast that you can outrun—"

The jinchūriki pair were in agreement. Isobu shook his chakra loose from its vague cloud around Kei's body until his head and forearms manifested in a translucent ghost. Bits of shell followed, as did all three of his tails, resulting in his form overlaying Kei's ANBU armor like the world's angriest glitchy hologram. A purplish Rasengan spun to life in his right palm, half-concealed by his armored fingers.

Kei, for her part, thumbed her katana free of the sheath just as Muscular's Quirk kicked into overdrive.

"—SOMEONE LIKE ME!"

Muscle fibers breached his skin in greater mass than ever before, long crossing the threshold from intimidating to just grotesque. No ordinary attack from an ordinary Quirk would be able to get through that mess. It was a perfect defense and offense at once.

Too bad for him there was really no such thing.

Curve of the Moon!

Tailed Beast Rasengan!

The kenjutsu art landed first, carving through flesh to reach bone and skin. The amount of chakra poured into the technique projected the edge outward in advance of the actual swing by at least a meter, and Kei's half-forgotten medic-nin training turned a samurai cutting tool into surgery in the way an ethics committee would dub horrific. Blood sprayed across the ground.

And then Isobu's remix of the Rasengan struck the middle of Muscular's newly-exposed gut.

Credit to Muscular: his sheer mass caused the Rasengan to take a half-second longer to kick Newton's First Law awake. Then he flew off his feet, unable to even scream.

Credit to Isobu: He'd turned a jab into a haymaker, and the Rasengan's trajectory launched Muscular into the cliff instead of into freefall. Isobu didn't use the technique on his own, and his had been larger than the standard Kei preferred, but he'd observed and made mental notes and figured out what he wanted from the jutsu.

Which was Muscular was currently lying in a heap while in the middle of an impact crater and therefore was no longer a problem. His muscle fibers retracted with a disturbing vlorp noise when he lost consciousness, leaving him just a man. An asshole of one, but still alive to complain about the fight later.

Kei sheathed her sword with a click as the chakra cloak faded.

When she turned, Kōta and Midoriya were both staggering in her direction. The kid was still fine, though tear-tracks cut through the dust on his face and his clothes were scuffed up, as expected. Midoriya, on the other hand, still made her inner medic-nin search for the big red panic button.

Kōta had one of his hands fixed in Midoriya's tattered T-shirt and the other on Kei's belt. His entire face crumpled as he began to bawl, hiccupping and dragging both Kei and Midoriya to their knees as he curled up.

Adrenaline was a funny thing.

"You—you took him out, right?" Midoriya panted, his left arm dangling uncomfortably. That had to be broken. "Turtle-san?'

Kōta sniffled into Midoriya's side, since was there and not wearing body armor. Seemed best. The Turtle persona was not built for being a huggable comfort object.

Kei nodded. She raised her left hand and patted Kōta's back, because she had to try, then said in the computerized, unrecognizable voice, "He'll stay down for a while. Why are you still here?"

Midoriya's face went grim. "If something went wrong, I couldn't let him hurt Kōta-kun."

And if they'd been jumped on the way back to the lodge, Muscular would have probably done exactly that. Going through Midoriya didn't seem to bother the guy who made that kind of first impression.

"H-h-he's the one," Kōta managed, through his tears. "The one I-I told you about, Turtle-san. He k-killed—"

Midoriya pulled Kōta into a one-armed hug, though he winced when Kōta reciprocated. Rib injuries? "Muscular's killed Kōta-kun's parents, and he—"

Kei had already known that, but something in Midoriya's expression kept her from saying so. "What is it?"

"He—Muscular asked me something, right before you got here." Midoriya's breathing was still a wreck, but the expression under the blood and pain was distilled determination. "He's after Kacchan. That's why they're attacking in the first place."

Oh for fuck's sake. Were it not for the Turtle mask and the circumstances, Kei's hand would be on a collision course with her forehead. And she'd be swearing properly. As it was, Isobu bit down on some of her anger and drowned it in the depths of their mindscape.

"Th-that's not what he said," Kōta broke in, still shaking. "He—he wanted to kill you."

And Midoriya's a target, too. Great.

Midoriya seemed to ignore that. "I need to get to Mandalay. I need to tell her—"

Kei shook her head, cutting him off. The airwaves were too silent for Kei's liking anyway. Or her nerves.

As Midoriya and Kota watched, she raised a hand to her radio and, in a clear, firm voice that didn't betray any of her actual feelings, said, "Turtle to all points. Kōta-kun and Midoriya-san are safe. The villain Muscular is down. The League of Villains is behind the attack. Their capture target is Bakugō Katsuki. I repeat: The League's target is Bakugō Katsuki. They're targeting other UA students, but he's their priority. Over."

Midoriya stared at her.

The radio maintained its stubborn silence.

"How did you know?" Midoriya asked. His wide-eyed expression didn't look like the fear Obito had been gleefully inflicting on the hero students for a few days now. It looked like a realization. "How'd you know Kacchan's real name?"

Behind her mask, Kei's face froze. Oh shit. But her mouth, spurred by Isobu, went with a dismissive, "My team has been monitoring UA for more than five months."

It was technically true, and therefore the best kind of true. Besides, damn near everyone in Japan had been doing the same thing.

"Eraserhead to Mandalay," Aizawa-sensei's voice cut across the connection, making Kei automatically raise a hand to silence any further Midoriya questions. "Broadcast to the students: 'Members of Class A and B, I, pro hero Eraserhead, hereby authorize you all for combat'."

It echoed through all their heads, leaving them ringing. Midoriya and Kōta reacted after Kei, because there was still a delay on Mandalay's end, but the message came through loud and clear.

Whatever happened next, the kids would have a chance to legally defend themselves with Aizawa-sensei potentially taking the fall.

They should have had that right before this ever started.

When in Rome… Kei didn't sigh, but it took some effort. Too late now.

Then there was Mandalay's follow-up: We've identified one of the villains' objectives! Bakugō Katsuki, avoid combat as much as possible! Stick together in a group and return to the lodge as soon as possible!

"Midoriya-san, can you take Kōta back?" Kei asked, wary of his busted arm.

"I—yeah. I can." He shuffled on his knees until Kōta could easily climb onto his back, which went well considering everything else. Midoriya's legs still both worked. He was a quick kid when he had to be, and he needed something to do. Now. Before he got into more trouble. "What about you? Or the fire?"

Right, Kōta's Quirk. He was the only one openly capable of dealing with a blaze, barring maybe Pixie-Bob.

"No civilians in a combat zone. You're clearing out until it's safe," Kei said in a flat tone. She considered her potential arguments, then revised them rapidly to "arguments that would be made by an otherwise reasonable person ignorant of Midoriya breaking his bones at people on national television." They were few. "Eraserhead and Vlad King will know where you can get that arm looked at, too."

As though that would motivate Midoriya to actually use that option. The stubborn set to his jaw said as much. "All three of us should head back. It's not safe out here."

Kei wasn't sure if she was supposed to take that as Midoriya arguing that the woods were full of villains (which they were), or if he was worried for her safety (which was pointless).

Luckily, Kakashi's voice spared her that internal debate. "Wolf to Turtle. Your next target is the Nōmu. Stand by for coordinates."

"Copy that, Wolf." With that, Kei shrugged off Kōta and Midoriya's justifiable caution. She backed off a couple of steps, turning her mask toward the forest without taking her eyes off them. "Midoriya-san, you are a hero in training. Your job right now is to protect yourself and Kōta-kun. I'll escort you as far as the lodge, but then I'm gone. Got it?"

Midoriya and Kōta both nodded.

Kei reached into the back of her mind and tapped Isobu's shoulder. Figuratively.

Finally,he said.

The chakra cloak flared back to life around her until it solidified into an opaque, rapidly-shifting V2 cloak. Under it, Kei's stance shifted forward until she balanced in a quadrupedal crouch, with one tail slicing through the air behind a newly-manifested spiky shell. To a casual observer, she was more beast than human.

To Midoriya Izuku, she was the nightmare from the USJ.

"Nothing gets past me. Nothing hurts you," Kei and Isobu said together. "Hurry, Midoriya-san. Your classmates are still in danger."

Midoriya, held together by determination, endorphins, and the solid-steel core that was built into him as a future hero, glowed green and ran.


AN: I reshuffled the order of the two fights in this chapter. My justification is that, unlike canon, everyone has radios. Why would they not have radios. The villains have radios, even if it's just between Dabi and the walking chainsaw dude.

The moniker for Muscular in this chapter, Meat Mountain, is courtesy of galacticplumber.